I suspect we'll have to agree to disagree on this, for I see little difference between the personality voting that's so hated and this practice.

I do understand your logic; I simply disagree with it. I don't think it's fair to the community as a whole, for your criteria involves something other than the node's quality. As chipmunk said earlier in the thread, "If you don't think a node's worthwhile then don't vote on it." This is part of what I was trying to get it when I suggested people vote responsibly.

And, for the record, your assumption is slightly wrong. (No need to duck; informed criticism is always welcome.) I do vote nodes down...when I feel the content is wrong, misguided, non-contributing, trollish, and so on. I do think certain nodes are overrated, but would rather (if enough of us are that upset over it) use a different approach to handle it.

I reward nodes I like, learn from, or feel have generated interesting conversation. But I do not punish nodes because they've been successful. I do not vote them down because I feel the community over-reacted. I simply don't feel that's fair to the poster.

It's a different point of view. That's all. I'm not saying you're right or wrong. I'm simply disagreeing with the practice.

If you feel voting a node for anything other than its content is wrong when we call it "personality voting," then how is "fitting a node" to its "appropriate" reputation any different? You're judging it against something other than its content. It's the same thing under a different name.

I may disagree with the community's overall assessment, but I'm willing to accept the fact that the tribe has spoken. Besides, there are enough nodes that teach me something that I don't really have votes remaining to "correct" their reputations.

The point of the jab was really the "mindless" part. You
seem to supported "considered non-voting" but insist that
voting be a mindless, simplistic calculation based solely
on node content. I strongly disagree.

If I voted strictly and enclusively on node content then I'd
only be allowed to vote on the very best nodes which means
that 90% of the monks would never get any of my votes.

I don't know where you got this moral stance but suspect
it stems from some misguided overextension of "voting
based solely on the author is bad". I agree with that
quote where you can replace "author" with just about
anyhing but "content". But, for most values of "X", I
strongly disagree with "taking X into consideration
when voting is bad".

I may disagree with the community's overall assessment,
but I'm willing to accept the fact that the tribe has
spoken.

I think you are demonstrating a logical fallacy here.
The "tribe" can't "speak" and the rep doesn't represent
the community's overall assessment. The rep mostly
(currently) represents how quickly the reply was posted
and how easy the node was to understand! Why should I
respect such a value??

I think taking global information into consideration when
voting is a good thing. It doesn't make my vote
unfair unless you think rep being mostly based on
speed and simplicity is fair. It isn't the case that speed
and simplicity became the biggest rep determiners due to
most monks valuing them over all other virtues. They have
the biggest influence on rep due to quirks in the voting
system and in the node presentation system.

So I'm bucking the quirks in the system for the benefit of
having the reps be more useful (and so that I feel
good about the way I voted). Sure, the reps
aren't extremely useful, but I you want to argue that I
shouldn't "play games" (come on, voting at all is more
"a game" than anything else) because the reps aren't
important, then lets just throw out voting altogether!